Chapel Hill , North Carolina -LRB- CNN -RRB- -- What happens to the 3,100 students who enrolled in fake classes and now have a degree stamped with the seal of the University of North Carolina , Chapel Hill -- an institution consistently ranked among the nation 's top public schools ?

Likely nothing .

The Southern Association of Colleges and Schools is currently reviewing a scathing report , prepared by former federal prosecutor Ken Wainstein , which showed thousands of UNC students took fraudulent classes , some of them multiple times .

But Belle Wheelan , the president of the association -- which is charged with accrediting degree-granting higher education institutions in the South , from Virginia to Texas -- told CNN that her group ca n't take away degrees .

`` UNC has to verify every degree they give all the time . We ask them to make sure all courses really are legitimate , '' Wheelan said . `` All we can do ... is put them on sanction for lack of integrity .

`` As far as taking those degrees back , there 's nothing we can do . ''

UNC officials told CNN say they are still deciding how to try to remedy the fact that so many students graduated with credits from the so-called `` paper classes '' on their transcripts .

Some students earned many credits taking multiple `` GPA booster '' classes . One student was enrolled in 19 different paper classes , Wainstein said .

`` We 're considering options on these matters and are working closely with SACS to evaluate possible courses of action , '' said spokesman Rick White .

UNC report : 18 years of academic fraud

Expert : ` Nearly impossible ' to take away degrees

Gerald Gurney , president of the Drake Group for academic integrity in collegiate sport and the former president of the National Association of Academic Advisers for Athletics , called the UNC fraud the largest and most nefarious academic scandal in the history of the NCAA .

`` The depth and breadth of the scheme -- involving counselors , coaches , academic administrators , faculty , athletic administrators , etc. -- eclipses any previous case , '' Gurney said .

But , while Gurney believes the NCAA should punish the university , he does not think that the students could lose the legitimacy of their degrees .

`` Lifting diplomas from students who were advised to take these classes is nearly impossible , '' he said .

The last time SACS investigated the paper classes -- when UNC insisted they existed on a much smaller scale -- the association made UNC offer new classes to students who had been enrolled in the fake ones . But the enrollment in the remedy class was optional , Wheelan said .

UNC told CNN that 11 students opted to retake a class .

The suspect classes were started by a professor 's assistant in the African-American studies program -LRB- AFAM -RRB- who had sympathy for those at the school who were `` not the best and the brightest . '' That assistant , Debbie Crowder , and professor Julius Nyang ` oro then worked with several advisers in athletics to help student-athletes on the brink of eligibility keep their GPAs up , according to the report .

One former football player , Mike McAdoo , told CNN earlier this year that his adviser told him to major in AFAM , and then put him in several paper classes , even though he had interest in majoring in something else .

From emails that were attached to Wainstein 's report , it 's clear that some athletes were placed in these classes because they were struggling .

One email , written by former women 's basketball academics adviser Jan Boxill , suggests an athlete is only enrolled in `` two real courses . ''

Other emails show how counselors were calculated in adding , then dropping , and shifting athletes from class to class trying to keep them eligible to play .

UNC fake class scandal and NCAA 's response wind their way to Washington

Report : Nearly half of 3,100 students were athletes

This all comes as no surprise to whistleblower Mary Willingham .

She sounded the alarm on paper classes and was a lone voice against the university when it insisted that the whole scheme fell to the shoulders of Nyang ` oro and Crowder alone .

Willingham told CNN that many people were involved and that the paper classes were used as a crutch for underprepared athletes . She said that in January -- a month before the Wainstein and his firm , Cadwalader , Wickersham & Taft , was hired by UNC to do another investigation into what happened over the last two decades .

Whistleblower in UNC paper class case files lawsuit

What Wainstein found was significantly bigger than what UNC had admitted to for the last five years .

Nearly half of the 3,100 students were athletes .

`` A good number of these student-athletes were `` steered '' to the AFAM paper classes by certain academic counselors in ASPSA , '' Wainstein 's report says . His report says paper classes served as `` GPA boosters '' for athletes who were on the brink of eligibility .

Why ?

Willingham says it 's because they were admitted to UNC just to play -- and they could n't keep up in the classroom the way they could keep up on the field , she says .

Willingham has been attacked for saying that . One UNC official even publicly said she was lying .

Now , the 131-page report and hundreds of supplemental documents appear to back her up .

Willingham sat at her kitchen table this week , watching the University of North Carolina admit to nearly two decades of academic fraud . All she could think about were the athletes she tutored who she says were terribly unprepared for real classes at UNC .

Many , she says , could barely read .

`` I think about where they are , you know , what are they doing , '' she said , sitting at that same table the next day . `` It 's hard to find a lot of those guys . And so I was wondering if they were paying any attention to this and if it had any meaning for them . ''

Federal education privacy rules forbid the university from publicly identifying the students involved in the paper classes .

UNC in January : We failed students ` for years '

Roy Williams : ` We tried to do the right thing '

UNC said the Wainstein report came to a different conclusion than previous investigations because he had the cooperation of Nyang ` oro and Crowder , who previously were n't talking . Nyang ` oro was charged with fraud -- a charge later dropped when he began cooperating with Wainstein .

But it 's unclear why previous investigations did not uncover the damning emails , or whether the statements of the athletic advisers were different in the past .

The latest one , though , did find that some coaches knew what was happening .

Former head football coach John Bunting , for instance , told investigators he knew of the paper classes . His successor , Butch Davis , who was fired a few years back for his role , also admitted some knowledge .

The investigators made no findings about Dean Smith , the legendary basketball coach and sports icon who coached 36 years at UNC .

And the current basketball coach , Roy Williams , has adamantly denied knowing anything .

Reacting Saturday to the report , Williams told reporters `` it 's a very sad time for me '' as not only UNC 's head basketball coach , but also a former assistant coach and student there .

As to what happens next , Williams said he does n't see anything in Wainstein 's report pertaining to `` men 's basketball that somebody can immediately look at and say this is going to happen or this is not going to happen . ''

`` The thing about it is that we tried to do the right thing , '' the coach said . `` I ca n't determine what the NCAA is going to do . ''

CNN analysis : Some college athletes play like adults , read like fifth-graders

CNN 's Devon Sayers and Greg Botelho contributed to this report .

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Accrediting group : Ca n't take degrees from those who took fraudulent classes

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UNC could be sanctioned for the fraud , this group 's president says

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Report by investigator found advisers funneled athletes to `` paper classes ''

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Men 's hoops coach : `` Very sad time '' for UNC ; `` we tried to do the right thing ''